Toronto Maple Leafs captain Auston Matthews skated in a grey jersey Saturday morning, prior to the team’s game against the Washington Capitals. Matthews has been officially ruled out of Saturday’s contest, and his status is unclear for Tuesday’s contest against the New York Islanders. He will miss his fourth consecutive game.

“He’s been on the ice the last couple of days. He’s making real good progress, which is great. He’s feeling a lot better,” Berube said of Matthews after Toronto’s team meeting on Saturday. Berube also said no target date has been set for Matthews’ return.

Matthews skated and shot on one end of the ice, working with a Maple Leafs staff member, with a primary focus on his skating and shooting. Unlike his sessions in November, Matthews appeared to be labouring and took breaks up to 2-3 minutes, before resuming shooting. The puck is still exploding off his stick at times, and there are instances where he looks like the player that scored 69 goals last season, but it appears to be a matter of consistency and conditioning.

Matthews also worked on puck retrieval and used the lower half of the offensive zone to work off the boards, before getting shots on net through the inner slot. There’s been no further update on his injury status at the time of his filing, but the fact that he’s skating with his usual velocity is encouraging, even if it’s similar to how he performed in November practice sessions, when he missed nine games.

Jani Hakanpaa was at the other end of the ice, also working with a Maple Leafs staffer. Hakanpaa was primarily working on his skating, both forwards and backwards, doing routine crossovers with and without the puck. The towering defenceman has played in just two games this season before being placed on injured reserve.

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